Working backwards, Digital Music News’ story on Motown’s recent “gutting”:

Universal Music Group is now gutting its Motown label, and folding the imprint and roster into various sister label groups. Radio-focused All Access pointed to a near-complete elimination of the Motown staff, and a folding of the imprint into Island Def Jam Music Group. The report also pointed to the migration of Motown sublabels Cash Money and SRC into Universal Republic.

That fits neatly into information from other sources, who have been pointing to a ‘de-East Coastification’ process at UMG for months. That includes the elimination and consolidation of various units, which is now unfolding before our very eyes.

Of course, Motown is an incredibly-powerful name, so the imprint will remain. But in business terms, this is either getting eliminated or massively reduced. Meanwhile, UMG umbrella units Universal Motown Republic Group and Island Def Jam Music Group have consolidated a number of backend functions to reduce redundencies and overhead, according to information confirmed by the company…

We’ve witnessed the blowout of Doug Morris. We’ve seen chairman Lucian Grainge pull the pants down on Antonio “LA” Reid, and delicately boot Sylvia Rhone to the curb. We’ve seen hundreds of layoffs, and marketshare dominance ceded to Sony Music Entertainment. But that’s just the beginning at Universal Music Group, according to multiple sources who have agreed to speak with Digital Music News…